Insurance Resources: The Integrated Risk Management Glossary

Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI): The maximum amount of chemicals a person can be exposed to daily in a lifetime without suffering
any negative health effects.

Acute Exposure: Short duration dose or multiple doses spanning less than 24 hours.

Acute Toxicity: The poisonous effect after an exposure. Generally within 24 to 96 hours.

Additional Risk (Added, Attributable Risk or Risk Difference) (AR): The risk calculated by finding the difference between
the people who are exposed and the people who aren’t exposed to a particular condition. Deduct the disease rate of
exposed people (Pu) from the unexposed people (Pe) to determine the absolute measure of risk (AR).

Adverse Effect: The reduced ability of an organism to adapt to environmental changes due to the effects of functional impairment,
biochemical change or pathologic wounds.

Aerodynamic Diameter: A sphere’s diameter possessing unit density which demonstrates identical aerodynamic behaviour
to a certain particle. Similar aerodynamic diameter particles might not necessarily have the same shape or dimensions.

Average Daily Dose (ADD): The average dose rate calculated over a specific duration of exposure. It’s expressed in
a daily dose basis. ADD is generally calculated in units such as mg/kg per day.

Background Levels: Antropogenic and naturally occurring levels describe the two background levels. In naturally occurring
levels, concentration of substances are present naturally while in anthropogenic levels, they are induced by humans.

Benchmark Dose (BMD) or Concentration (BMC): Compared to background levels, it refers to a dose’s lower confidence
limit which creates a change in the rate of response to a benchmark response (adverse effect).

Benchmark Response (BMR): Refers to adverse effect which defines a benchmark dose. RfC is developed from this benchmark
dose. The response rate changes over the BMR background are between 5-10%.

Benign Tumor: A tumor which may impair a biological function but doesn’t spread to a secondary localization.

Bioassay: An assay that determines a substance’s concentration for bringing about a biological change in experimental
animals.

Bioavailability: The amount of substance which is available to a target tissue after exposure.

Biologically Based Dose Response (BBDR) Model: A predictive tool for assessing human health risks by quantifying the responses
(cellular or tissue) to a chemical exposure.

Oncogenic: A gene having the capacity to cause a cell’s neoplastic transformation when introduced to that cell.

Organoleptic: Affecting one of the five sense organs such as the tongue, eyes or ears.

ppb: A measuring unit which is expressed as parts per billion (1 x 10-9).

ppm: A measuring unit which is expressed as parts per million (1 x 10-6).

Promoter: A non-carcinogenic agent which stimulates a cell’s clonal expansion and neoplasm production.

Regional Gas Dose: The calculated gas dose for a particular region of interest relative to the effect observed for respiratory
effects.

Reserve Volume: Following a maximal expiration, the volume of air that remains in the lungs.

Risk (in the context of human health): The probability of death or disease after exposure to a chemical agent. The values
between 0 and 1 express the proportion of risk.

Short-Term Exposure: A short term multiple agent exposure which generally lasts one week.

Subchronic Exposure: An organism which is exposed to a substance for about 10% of its lifetime.

Subchronic Study: A study which measures the toxicity effects from a chemical’s subchronic exposure.

Target Organ: The biological organ or organs which are damaged the most as a result of a chemical substance exposure.

Threshold: The maximum limit of exposure or dose by which no harmful effect occurs.

Toxicology: The study which pertains to the assessment of harmful relations between biological systems and chemicals.

Tumor: Uncontrolled growth of cells which is abnormal.

Unit Risk: The upper-bound cancer risk which results from a constant exposure to an agent.

Upper bound: Upper limit of a quantity’s true value which is credible.

Vital Capacity (VC): The maximum volume of air that an individual can exhale in one breath.

Weight-of-Evidence (WOE) for Carcinogenicity: The system that the US EPA uses for evaluating the degree to which the data
available with the EPA matches the claim that a particular agent causes human cancer.